Traditional and Non-Traditional Renaissance Femininity in Shakespeare´s Plays

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“Much Ado About Nothing” is a romantic comedy (Hamilton, p. 49) written between 1598 and 1599 (The British Library) by William Shakespeare. The main plot of the play is concerned with the relationship between the young lovers Claudio and Hero, and the sub-plots, in descending order of significance are a) the relationship between Hero’s cousin Beatrice and Claudio’s friend Benedick; b) Don John’s plot against Claudio and c) the constables Dogberry and Verges, their arrest of Borachio and their discovery of Don John’s deception. (Hamilton, p. 49) However, the first subplot of the play tends to overshadow the main plot (Bryant, p. 126), with Benedick and Beatrice being more vivid, memorable and relatable characters than their staid counterparts Claudio and Hero. (Jay, p. 28) Beatrice, in particular, is interesting in her subversion of traditional Renaissance femininity, and her role as a heroine of the play despite this unconventionality. Comedy, as a genre, is less serious and formulaic than that of tragedy. (Hamilton, p. 49) It is not expected to discuss the human condition or delve deeply into social issues. (Neilson, p. 377) “From the nature of this kind of drama, we do not expect in it the depth of penetration into human motive or the call upon our profounder sympathies that we find in Tragedy; and the conventional happy ending of Comedy makes difficult the degree of truth to life that one expects in serious plays.” (Neilson, p. 377) However, Shakespeare’s comedies are not completely shallow. Many of them, such as “The Merchant of Venice” comment on social issues of the time, in the case of “The Merchant of Venice”, anti-Semitism (Shankman, p. 65) (Cohen, p. 25), albeit in less detail than Shakespeare’s tragedies or historica... ... middle of paper ... ...at marriage is the ideal state of women, and negates most of the challenges the character of Beatrice and her “inappropriate” behaviour pose to the established patriarchal system of Renaissance England. While Beatrice as an unconventional heroine is the most commonly analysed female character in “Much Ado About Nothing”, it is important to note that she is only one of the five female characters present in the play, among Innogen, Hero, Margaret and Ursula, and thus her behaviour in the play does not exist alone, but is compared and contrasted with the behaviour of the other female characters in the play. Most modern editions of the play tend to leave out the character of Innogen, who while listed in the Dramatis Personae of the play, is only present in two scenes (Act 1 Scene 1 and Act 2 Scene 1) and has no lines whatsoever. This silence is especially notable, as

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